A 15-storey condo tower—well under construction in the Metro Vancouver suburb of Richmond­—was stopped cold in August following a dispute between the construction company and the developer.
Scott Construction, the company building the Alfa condo development, terminated its contract with developer Anderson Square Holdings and told their subcontractors to stop working on the project.
Scott Construction told the Richmond News that it was suing Anderson Square Holdings for $4.6 million for extra costs associated with delays on the project.
This followed the cancellation of pre-sales in the project.
Darin Hughes of Scott Construction said the company became “increasingly concerned” that Anderson Square Holdings couldn’t pay Scott and its subcontractors after letters were sent out saying they couldn’t get a construction financing commitment
“Unfortunately, Anderson Square Holdings couldn’t demonstrate to us they had secured reasonable evidence of financial arrangements to fulfill their obligations under the contract,” Hughes said. “As a result, we have terminated our contract with the client.”
Hughes added that Scott Construction is committed to making sure their subcontractors have “as much certainty as possible” to be paid for their work.
“As a result, we needed to let them know they can stop work and start making plans to get other projects,” Hughes explained. “We did that this last week. We value our relationships with our clients and we hope we can resolve this quickly and fairly.”
Anderson Square Holdings notified its customers in July that it was cancelling pre-sale contracts for the Alfa development with a full refund of deposits plus interest.
Pre-sales of new condos in Metro Vancouver have slowed sharply this year leading to the cancellation of a number of planned condo projects.